A LICHFIELD drinker today admitted his part in the pub brawl which ended in the arrest of the city's mayor and said: "He's completely innocent."

A LICHFIELD drinker today admitted his part in the pub brawl which ended in the arrest of the city's mayor and said: "He's completely innocent."

Mike Morgan, aged 64, claimed he was the man who attacked a fellow customer in the King's Head pub, not Lichfield's First Citizen.

The former photographer, of Stowe Street, Lichfield, said: "The mayor didn't thump the guy - I did.

"I admitted the offence to the police and was cautioned for it and then released.

"The mayor was an innocent bystander. The only reason he has been singled out is because he is the mayor."

Mr Morgan, who went to school with the mayor - Tory councillor Michael Fryers - in the 1950s, claimed the brawl broke out in the early hours of Saturday morning after a fellow drinker allegedly attacked a friend, Susannah Stanton.

"This guy accused me and Mike Fryers of making comments about Susannah. The next thing I knew the lady was in distress on the floor," he said.

"Susannnah said the man pushed her to the floor. I just stood up and smacked him in the face. Perhaps in hindsight, I wished I hadn't, but I did."

Both Mr Morgan and Coun Fryers spent a night in police cells at nearby Tamworth on suspicion of assault and were later released.